re really his, how many faults
may have been unjustly laid to his account from arbitrary Additions,
Expunctions, Transpositions of scenes and lines, confusion of Characters
and Persons, wrong application of Speeches, corruptions of innumerable
Passages by the Ignorance, and wrong Corrections of 'em again by the
Impertinence, of his first Editors? From one or other of these
considerations, I am verily perswaded, that the greatest and the grossest
part of what are thought his errors would vanish, and leave his character
in a light very different from that disadvantageous one, in which it now
appears to us.

This is the state in which _Shakespear_'s, writings lye at present; for
since the above-mentioned Folio Edition, all the rest have implicitly
followed it, without having recourse to any of the former, or ever making
the comparison between them. It is impossible to repair the Injuries
already done him; too much time has elaps'd, and the materials are too
few. In what I have done I have rather given a proof of my willingness and
desire, than of my ability, to do him justice. I have discharg'd the dull
duty of an Editor to my best judgment, with more labour than I expect
thanks, with a religious abhorrence of all Innovation, and without any
indulgence to my private sense or conjecture. The method taken in this
Edition will show it self. The various Readings are fairly put in the
margin, so that every one may compare 'em; and those I have prefer'd into
the Text are constantly _ex fide Codicum_, upon authority. The Alterations
or Additions which _Shakespear_ himself made, are taken notice of as they
occur. Some suspected passages which are excessively bad (and which seem
Interpolations by being so inserted that one can intirely omit them
without any chasm or deficience in the context) are degraded to the bottom
of the page; with an Asterisk referring to the places of their insertion.
The Scenes are mark'd so distinctly that every removal of place is
specify'd; which is more necessary in this Author than any other, since he
shifts them more frequently: and sometimes, without attending to this
particular, the reader would have met with obscurities. The more obsolete
or unusual words are explained. Some of the most shining passages are
distinguish'd by comma's in the margin; and where the beauty lay not in
particulars but in the whole, a star is prefix'd to the scene. This seems
to me a shorter and less ostentatious method of p